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NAME

       alsamixer  -  soundcard  mixer  for ALSA soundcard driver, with ncurses
       interface

SYNOPSIS

       alsamixer [options]

DESCRIPTION

       alsamixer is an ncurses mixer program for use with the  ALSA  soundcard
       drivers. It supports multiple soundcards with multiple devices.

OPTIONS

       -h, --help
              Help: show available flags.

       -c, --card <card number or identification>
              Select  the  soundcard  to use, if you have more than one. Cards
              are numbered from 0 (the default).

       -D, --device <device identification>
              Select the mixer device to control.

       -V, --view <mode>
              Select the starting view mode, either playback, capture or  all.

       -g, --no-color
              Toggle the using of colors.

MIXER VIEWS

       The  top-left  corner  of  alsamixer  is  the  are  to  show some basic
       information: the card name, the mixer chip name, the current view  mode
       and the currently selected mixer item.  When the mixer item is switched
       off, [Off] is displayed in its name.

       Volume bars are located below the  basic  information  area.   You  can
       scroll  left/right  when  all controls can’t be put in a single screen.
       The name of each control is shown in the bottom below the volume  bars.
       The currently selected item is drawn in red and/of emphasized.

       Each  mixer  control with volume capability shows a box and the current
       volume filled in that box.  The volume percentages are displayed  below
       the  volume  bar for left and right channels.  For a mono control, only
       one value is shown there.

       When a mixer control is turned off, M (mute) appears below  the  volume
       bar.   When it’s turned on, O in green appears instead.  You can toggle
       the switch via m key.

       When a mixer control has capture capability, the capture  flag  appears
       below  the volume bar, too.  When the capture is turned off, ------- is
       shown.  CAPTURE in red appears when the capture switch  is  turned  on.
       In  addition, L and R letters appear in left and right side to indicate
       that left and the right channels are turned on.

       Some controls have the enumeration list, and don’t show boxes but  only
       texts  which  indicate  the  currently active item.  You can change the
       item via up/down keys.

VIEW MODES

       alsamixer has three view modes: playback,  capture  and  all.   In  the
       playback  view,  only  the  controls  related  with playback are shown.
       Similarly, only the controls for capture (recording) are shown  in  the
       capture  view.  The all view mode shows all controls.  The current view
       mode is displayed in the top-left  position  together  with  the  mixer
       name, etc.

       The  default  view mode is the playback view.  You can change it via -V
       option.

       Each view mode can be switched via keyboard  commands,  too.   See  the
       next section.

KEYBOARD COMMANDS

       alsamixer  recognizes  the  following  keyboard commands to control the
       soundcard.  Commands shown here in upper case  can  also  be  given  in
       lower case.  To be reminded of these keystrokes, hit the h key.

   General Controls
       The  Left  and  right  arrow  keys  are  used to select the channel (or
       device, depending on your preferred terminology). You can  also  use  n
       ("next") and p ("previous").

       The  Up  and  Down Arrows control the volume for the currently selected
       device. You can also use + or - for the same purpose. Both the left and
       right signals are affected. For independent left and right control, see
       below.

       The B or = key adjusts  the  balance  of  volumes  on  left  and  right
       channels.

       M toggles muting for the current channel (both left and right).  If the
       hardware supports it, you can mute  left  and  right  independently  by
       using , (or <) and . (or >) respectively.

       SPACE  enables recording for the current channel. If any other channels
       have  recording  enabled,  they  will  have  their  recording  function
       disabled first. This only works for valid input channels, of course.

       L re-draws the screen.

   View Mode Controls
       Function  keys  are  used  to change view modes.  You can switch to the
       help mode and the proc info mode via F1 and F2 keys, respectively.   On
       terminals  that  can’t  use  function keys like gnome-terminal, ? and /
       keys can be used alternatively for help and proc modes.

       F3, F4 and F5 keys are used to switch to playback, capture and all view
       mode,  respectively.  TAB key toggles the current view mode circularly.

   Quick Volume Changes
       PageUp increases volume by 5.

       PageDown decreases volume by 5.

       End sets volume to 0.

       You can also control left  &  right  levels  for  the  current  channel
       independently, as follows:

       [Q | W | E ]  -- turn UP [ left | both | right ]

       [Z | X | C ] -- turn DOWN [ left | both | right ]

       If  the  currently selected mixer channel is not a stereo channel, then
       all UP keys will work like W, and all DOWN keys will work like X.

       The number keys from 0 to 9 are to change the absolute volume  quickly.
       They correspond to 0 to 90% volume.

   Selecting the Sound Card
       You  can  select another sound card by pressing the F6 or S keys.  This
       will show a list of available sound cards to choose from, and an  entry
       to enter the mixer device name by hand.

   Exiting
       Quit  the  program with ALT Q, or by hitting ESC.  Please note that you
       might need to hit ESC twice on some terminals since it’s regarded as  a
       prefix key.

SEE ALSO

        amixer(1), aplay(1), arecord(1)

BUGS

       Some  terminal  emulators  (e.g.  nxterm) may not work quite right with
       ncurses, but that’s their own damn fault. Plain old xterm seems  to  be
       fine.

AUTHOR

       alsamixer has been written by Tim Janik <timj@gtk.org> and been further
       improved  by  Jaroslav  Kysela  <perex@perex.cz>  and  Clemens  Ladisch
       <clemens@ladisch.de>.

       This manual page was provided by Paul Winkler <zarmzarm@erols.com>.

                                  22 May 2009